Tuesday, January 02, 2007

Happy New Year and then some

I'm sitting in the apartment alone, the pretty Victorian lampshade, a beige thing of fringes, casts a yellow glow over the mysterious new radio and my notebook is splayed open. Fresh page. A long fluted glass filled with golden Drambuie, just opened, sweet, tastes of honey, dissolves tears. The phone rings a couple of times. Parties. Come join us. But no, it will be the first day of my year alone. I have to see it in likewise. Anita was over earlier. We broke open the bottle together. Clinked glasses. She's off to a party. The radio is on at Mix. Or maybe it was Light and Easy. Or I could have been playing a CD, way down low. Mood is everything. Ritual is everything. A sip of Drambuie and I scribble down a few dreams. I don't remember what they were. We finished the Drambuie later that year in a train. We passed it from person to person, drank straight from the bottle.

Sometimes you have to drink Drambuie straight from the bottle if life is to make sense.

Fast forward: I'm talking to someone who has made up her mind. My words, hard little bullets, bounce off her force-field. She smiles benign and peaceful when one gets through. And I think, man, I've made a hit. But not really. They start to die when they've decided. And nothing you say will make a difference. Remember me, remember what I was like, before all this. What do you mean? Remember me...

Trying to make sense of life. No sense. A sip of Drambuie. Nothing. I eat up books like air. Still no sense. No little truths to illuminate more than a page or sear through me. Just nuggets like my ineffectual bullets, bouncing off a mind, saturated and sad. Sometimes happy. Which is the illusion? If Dylan couldn't tell you, what makes you think I could?

Everywhere people finding themselves. Moving into comfortable spaces. Yes, this is life when you don't resist it. You grow and fill out the space. Complete in yourself. Complete in your family. Complete in your truths. This is life. This is the way things are supposed to be. You're not happy because you swim against the tides. Give up. Give in. This is the way things are supposed to be.

12 comments:

dandelion
said...

Jenn...when we "Give up. Give in." I think we stop living. I love your New year post...the past, the present and hope for the future. I am wishing for you that all you dreams for 2007 become reality. Will talk more soon.

About Me

I am a product of long corridors, empty sunlit rooms, upstairs indoor silences, attics explored in solitude, distant noises of gurgling cisterns and pipes and the noise of wind under the tiles. Also, of endless books. (CS Lewis)